In the garden I stopped, hiding away a scrap of a lace handkerchief I had stolen; wondering if I had been altogether wrong, yet not able to see what other course had been open.
Lingering near the window I saw Lady Vale-Avon go to Monica, and hold the girl by the hand while she talked with Carmona. They spoke only a few words. Then the Duke opened the door, and the two ladies went out, Monica not once looking up.
No sooner had they gone than Carmona walked to the window, and seeing me in the glimmering night joined me.
“This is my mother’s house,” he said in Spanish.
“And her garden, you would add,” I answered.
“Yes.”
“But there’s something here that is mine.”
“There is nothing here that is yours.” His voice, studiously cold at first, warmed with anger.
“It will be mine some day, in spite of—everything.”
“You boast, Marqués de Casa Triana.”
“No. For Lady Monica Vale has promised to marry me.”
Carmona caught his breath on a word by which, if he had not stopped to think, he would have given me the lie. But something restrained him and he laughed instead. “I wouldn’t count on the fulfilment of her promise if I were you,” he said. “Lady Monica’s a schoolgirl. I would tell you, for your own sake, that the best thing you can do is to forget you ever saw her; but that will be a waste of breath. What I will say is, you’ll be wise to leave Biarritz before anything disagreeable happens.”
“I intend to leave Biarritz,” I said quietly.
“I’m glad to hear it.”
“When Lady Monica and her mother leave.”
“You intend to persecute these ladies!”
“Not at all. But when they go to visit the Duchess of Carmona, that will be—the time I shall choose for leaving Biarritz.”
“Who has spoken of such a visit?”
“A person I trust.”
He was silent for a moment, whether in surprise or anger I could not tell. But at last he said, “I’m less well-informed than your friend as to the plans of Lady Vale-Avon and her daughter. They may return to England; they may go to friends in Paris, they may visit my mother. But this doesn’t concern strangers like yourself; and my advice to the Marqués de Casa Triana is, whatever happens, keep out of Spain.”
“Do you threaten me?” I asked.
“I don’t threaten—I warn.”
“Thanks for your kind intentions. They give me food for thought.”
“All the better. You’ll be less likely to forget.”
“I shan’t forget,” I answered. “Indeed, I shall profit by your advice.” And with that I walked away, putting on my mask.
As Romeo had not known at what hour he might wish to leave the house of Capulet, he had ordered neither his own motor-car nor a carriage; but luckily a cab was lingering in the neighbourhood on the chance of a fare. I was glad not to walk to my hotel in the guise of Romeo; and I gained my quarters without meeting curious eyes in the corridors.
As I expected, Dick was in our private sitting-room, smoking and reading a novel.
“Well, what luck, friend Romeo?” he asked.
“Luck, and ill luck,” said I. Then I told the story of the evening.
“Humph! you’ve gone and got yourself into a pretty scrape,” was his comment at the end.
“You call it a ‘scrape’ when by a miracle the sweetest girl alive has fallen in love with you?”
“Just that, if the girl isn’t old enough to know her own mind, and has a mother who wouldn’t let her know it if she could. You’ve gone so far now, you’ll have to go further—”
“As far as the end of the world, if necessary.”
“Oh! you Latin men, with your eyes of fire, your boiling passions, and your exaggerated expressions! What do we Yankees and other sensible persons see in you?”
“Heaven knows,” said I, shrugging my shoulders.
“I doubt it. Why, in the name of common sense, as you’d got to the age of twenty-seven without bothering about love, couldn’t you wait till the age of twenty-seven and a quarter, go quietly over to my country with me, a long sight better than the ‘end of the world,’ and propose to a charming American girl of rational age and plenty of dollars?”
“A rational age?”
“Over eighteen, anyhow. I believe you Latins have a fancy for these little white ingénues, who don’t know which side their bread’s buttered, or how to say anything but ‘Yes, please,’ and ‘No, thank you.’ When my time comes, the girl must be twenty-two and a good, patriotic American.”
“American girls are fascinating, but I happen to be in love with an English one, and it’s her misfortune and mine, not our fault, that she’s eighteen instead of twenty-two.”
“A big misfortune. You mustn’t kidnap an infant. That’s what makes it awkward. As I said, you can’t back out now.”
“Not while I live.”
“Don’t be so Spanish. But come to think of it, I suppose you can’t help that. What do you mean to do next?”
“Watch. And get word to Monica.”
“Angèle de la Mole will do what she can for you.”
“I hope so. Then everything else must depend on the girl.”
Dick’s lean, tanned face was half quizzical, half sad.
“Everything else must depend on the girl,” he repeated. “I wonder what would happen if anybody tried to prop up a hundred pound weight against a lilybud?”
